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Laerdil heard Lord Athanar's question to the word. He also, carefully, observed the thoughts that shimmered across the surface of his mind. There he sensed that this lord held himself deeply obliged to the underling because of the loyalty of this man's forebears.
Laerdil also read the discomfort in Eodwine at this line of questioning, for the man had been lord here in Scarburg until he had fallen ill and was considered doomed to die from it; and now here he was, lord no longer, determined to do his duty by Lord Athanar to the best of his ability, and yet there was in this Eodwine a chagrin of which he himself was not even aware, that he should be lord rather than Athanar. It was something he did not allow himself to think, but it lay deep within nonetheless.
To complicate matters further, Athanar ruled in a more decisive, straightforward fashion whereas Eodwine led with a lighter hand and by personal touch; and he had grown up a farmer rather than a lord and so believed that Athanar had the greater claim to lordship. A most complicated matter. And here, Laerdil had thought such niceties were only to be found among the Eldar.
He pitied them their short lives and high passions.
"The man of whom you speak is valued," Laerdil began, "but disloyalty to a lord's right hand man is disloyalty to the lord. It does not matter how recently he came to be a right hand man. The punishment should teach the servant through deed the evil of his wrong and the worth of the right. Then he will be a better and yet more loyal liege man, to both lord and right hand man."
Even as Laerdil was speaking these words, he felt a mind focused upon him, from near the hearth, with fear. Now this mind came near and passed him by, and left the Hall, going into the kitchen. It was the woman and the boy with the burnt hand. He sighed. It would have to be dealt with later, if at all.
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